by WILLIAM LLOYD GEORGE
Like most Saturdays, Sara Muñoz went to deposit money at the local bank in Toribio, a small town in Cauca province, southern Colombia. While waiting in line with her three small children, she suddenly heard loud explosions from outside. The FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) – leftwing guerrillas who have been fighting the state government since the 1960s – had stormed the town and detonated a car bomb outside the police station. Being only a block away from the blast, the roof of the bank was blown off, trapping Muñoz and her children. ‘It was terrifying. We didn’t know what had happened, we were just stuck there,’ says Muñoz, clearly traumatized by the event.
At the time, her father was working at his meat stall, a couple of blocks away in the local market, in the main square. One of the gas cylinders which the guerrillas used for the homemade bomb was hurled through the local church and hit him in the head. The family’s house next to the police station was completely destroyed. ‘We have no idea what we will do now; we are too scared to stay here,’ Muñoz continues, while trying to comfort her children. She says that they have not been able to sleep since the attack. ‘So many times innocent native people are being caught up in a conflict that we have nothing to do with.’
NI for more